


a new suit

by asokatanos (Emryslin)



Series: object permanence [3]
Category: The Mentalist
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 02:08:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24545929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emryslin/pseuds/asokatanos
Summary: “You’re the best friend I’ve ever had,” he tells her seriously, happily watching as her glare melts into a smile.Her fingers soften and weave once, twice along the crown of his head before she says, “me too.”
Relationships: Patrick Jane/Teresa Lisbon
Series: object permanence [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1768321
Comments: 8
Kudos: 49





	a new suit

The water is still, a gentle breeze stirring only the barest ruffles into its surface, belying none of the teeming life underneath. The family of ducks are the same, their sleek bodies gliding gently and effortlessly above the water even as their feet are hard at work propelling them below. Somewhere on the banks of the little lake is a little cabin - seemingly empty on the outside, but a riot of plans and expansion permits and construction accoutrements might be found within its four walls.

The perpetrator of those plans lays in the grass in a park a mile or so away, head pillowed on his fiancée’s thigh and a book propped up against his raised knee. Like his lake and his ducks and his cabin, he too is outwardly still, enjoying the sun on his face and the feel of his fiancée’s fingers resting in his hair. The hand - his left - not occupied by his book is resting lightly on her wrist, index finger held gently against the pulse at the base of her thumb. 

The owner of that pulse is, unlike the man and his lake and his ducks and his cabin, not so still. Her dark hair dances in the light breeze that lifts the scent of her shampoo and deposits it around them, and her eyes rove back and forth as she reads from the novel in her hand. She has read the same sentence exactly seven times now, her thoughts far from the words on the page. Her fingers tap a slight staccato into the next paragraph. 

The wind brings with it the shrieking sounds of children at play nearby, and she very deliberately resists the impulse to move either of her occupied hands to her abdomen. She has a secret to share, one that is hiding behind her teeth and waiting with extreme impatience to tumble out into the ears of the man who has thankfully as yet failed to guess. She nearly blurted it out the day before when he’d told her beautiful things and asked her a question she’d never dared dream he would ask. 

The elation that had immediately caught hold upon hearing the question had been nearly forceful enough to pull the secret out, making her answer rush through her lips with a nearly awkward lack of elegance. The smile that had chased the answer was both beautiful and sincere, and the awkwardness took hold of him instead, pulling his relief to the surface and making him sound uncharacteristically but adorably unsure. 

He looks up at her suddenly now, his eyes squinting against the sun. Her eyes meet his, and then come to rest on his hand, which is still loosely curled around her wrist. Her lips twitch, and he realizes that her gaze is caught on the pale stretch of skin on his ringless finger that nearly gleams in the sunlight. He tightens his hand briefly to let her know he’s read her, and then calls her attention again by lifting his hand to poke her in the ribs. 

Predictably, she yelps, ticklish. Unpredictably, she flinches so hard his head nearly bounces off her leg, and his resulting chuckles are met by her dark but heatless glare. Catching her wrist again, he deposits her hand back in his hair before smiling sunnily up at her.

“You’re the best friend I’ve ever had,” he tells her seriously, happily watching as her glare melts into a smile. 

Her fingers soften and weave once, twice along the crown of his head before she says, “me too.”

Her hand stills then, and she hesitates, but brings her hand down to trace along one of the laughter lines in his cheek as she speaks. “It took us a long time to get here, and I know there’s things we both regret. I know I wish we got here a long time ago.”

She stops, meets his eyes. “But I’m really glad we were friends first. I wouldn’t give that up for anything.”

Slightly misty, he tilts his face into her hand and closes his eyes for a moment, and then leans so he can press his lips against the pulse in her wrist. 

“Happy anniversary.” His voice is soft, murmured against her skin.

“We aren’t married yet,” she points out helpfully, and doesn’t add that they haven’t even been dating long enough to have a relationship anniversary. But she can’t help the bubble of joyful disbelief that fills her at the thought that they will be _married_ soon. The infuriating, endearing, enigmatic man now playing with her fingers is soon to be her _husband_.

He grins widely at her, shaking his head against her leg. She sets her book down at her side, as taken by that expression as she was the first time he’d turned it on her. 

“It’s the anniversary of the day we met. Thirteen years ago.” He trails off, and then adds, “you told me I had a homeless vibe,” as if the memory isn’t so precious and fresh to her that she’d need help remembering. 

She slides one of her hands down to rest on his chest, leaving the other in his hair. He’s still looking at her, but she watches her own hands instead, and doesn’t speak. He guesses she’s thinking of the way he’d looked that day. For all he’d claimed to her later that he was just trying to manipulate his way into seeing the Red John files, he knows she had seen right through to the heart of him almost instantly. She had recognized loss when she saw it. Probably, her brothers had looked like that in moments when they thought she wasn’t looking, when they just wanted their mother. 

“I went out and bought a suit that day, you know. First thing I bought for myself- after.”

She does meet his eyes then, and smiles as she tangles the fingers of her right hand with his left. “The first and last time you ever listened to me, huh?”

“I always _listen_ , just don’t always follow orders!”

“Mm, so you just easily ignore me then.”

“Never. You’re pretty hard to ignore, dearest.”

“Such a great difficulty for you to run off with your insane plans and not listen to me.”

She’s rolling her eyes and smirking at him, telegraphing her lack of offense, and he is humbled by how much she has loved him to forgive him everything. It is what terrified him about allowing himself to love her out loud, having long been of the opinion that to love someone is to willingly hand over the power to hurt you. The worst thing he could do to her is to leave, and he has already done it too many times. The worst thing she could do to him is to die, and he will spend the rest of his life hoping she doesn’t.

When he’d first laid eyes the cabin and the lake and the ducks, he’d seen it all nearly in double. Partially what it looked like at that moment and partially what it would look like in moments stretching on for the rest of his life. She’d been there for all of them, and it hurt to try to imagine them without her. Whether her job put her in the line of fire or not, whether or not he knew that she might one day simply never come home, he had known in that moment that he’d already given her that power over him long ago. The only thing left was to let her know she could keep it - forever.

The smirk is dropping off her face at whatever expression she sees on his, so he tells her seriously, “I’m never running from you ever again. Not matter what.”

And then before she has the chance to find her gravitas, he adds cheekily, “pretty soon you’ll never be able to get rid of me either.”

He sets his forgotten book aside and taps his ring finger, smiling widely. 

“Well then we’re gonna have to do a better job convincing every lunatic out there to stop trying to blow you up, hmm?”

“Meh. The explosion was my doing, not his. Nice, dramatic way to get free.”

“Who said you weren’t one of the aforementioned lunatics?”

“Hey! It worked, didn’t it? Besides, you’re the one who just agreed to marry me.”

“God help me, I am! Guess I’m just trying to look at the bright side.”

“What’s that?”

“I’ll be marrying the man who always runs back to me, even if he has to survive explosions to do it.”

“And twelve foot airport fences, don’t forget!”

"Right, how could I forget - I'll also be marrying the most embarrassing man in the world."

"Love you too, Lisbon."

He buys a new suit the next day, and smiles when he selects the blue tie to go with it.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm American, and it's been weird at best to have landed in a hyperfixation for a show that has anything to do with law enforcement right now. Granted, I was watching back in March, but this having become the natural outlet to write into is a little- weird.
> 
> This one started as a crystal clear picture of those two sitting in the park and Jane telling Lisbon she's the best friend he's ever had, but I couldn't figure out what else was happening until I was talking to my own friend about love and forgiveness. The rest came easy! And as a bonus I got to throw in a line about the bright side - I couldn't help but feel like their vow to each other in White Orchids was referring to a previous conversation, so here it is!


End file.
